


Not-Here

by RemainingQuestions



Category: Hermitcraft RPF
Genre: Gen, OC POV, haha void go brrr, themes of being unwanted, themes of not belonging
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-08-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:54:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25716874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RemainingQuestions/pseuds/RemainingQuestions
Summary: What happens to players after they're banned?What happens to glitches when they're 'fixed'?A conversation Nowhere. A solution somewhere.
Comments: 10
Kudos: 47





	Not-Here

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sprucewoodcottage (ironmermaidens)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ironmermaidens/gifts).



> Glitch uses it/its! and is literally the personification of a glitch!

The Void is a place of lacking. A place of absence. 

The Void, not the void under the world, but the Void, beyond the world, was a place of not-s. 

It was the place banned players went. Those not-connected. Not-anywhere else. 

It was not a fun place to be. The Void didn’t want anyone to exist within it. 

Most players would leave without even noticing their stay. Maybe they would see the blank-nothing when connecting to a server they couldn’t, anymore and recognise it as the Void. 

Most players, after being banned, could go somewhere else. Anywhere else. 

Some had more difficulty. 

The Void would try to push them out anyway. It did not want anyone to exist within it. 

For all that people are great at anthropomorphising any and everything, Glitch thought, they sure never attempt to anthropomorphize  _ glitches _ . Never consider it could be anything other than a wrong line of code. Anything but an error to be erased and removed A S A P. 

Glitch was intimately familiar with the feeling of the Void.

The feeling of nothing pressing down into you, pressing the ‘you’ out of you. Attempting to, at least. 

But the Void was a place of not-s. So Glitch belonged in the Void because it belonged not-anywhere else. 

It could move by being not-where it used to be. 

It hurt its brain to have to think like that. But it relieved the pressure, somewhat. 

There was nothing for its hands to trail on while it wandered so it trailed its hands over Nothing. 

It didn’t not-help to wander during its time in the Void. Until there was a crack it could use to get out again. Until there was another world it could try existing in. 

But sometimes it caught glances of players, of worlds. 

Sometimes it could imagine those sparks were worth being in the Void. 

It had to be someone that had seen the most different players, the most different worlds, right? 

Despite being able to think in not-s, Glitch was not good at lying to itself. 

It had seen so many things in the Void. 

But there was one thing it hadn’t seen, in all the times it had been thrown into this place, for minutes and hours and years. 

But the Void was a place of not-s. So there was not-a thing it hadn’t seen. 

Glitch stopped, felt the ripple of Nothing under his fingers as it saw someone bash against the Nothing. 

They were a player, clearly. Some kind of armor. A helmet. Mostly red. 

Angry. 

Glitch hadn’t talked in so long. It waved by making its arm be not-by its side.

The player didn’t notice, continued to bang against Nothing, continued… entering a world? 

It was not-silent, so it was speaking. “Hey?” Its voice was rough, but the player had stopped banging at least. 

Glitch wondered if they understood how to move, if it would need to explain that. If it even could. 

But the player turned, facing not-Nothing and instead Glitch. Their eyes were bright red behind a visor. “What?” 

“Uh, whatcha doing?” It said. It was not-distant and thus stepped closer. 

The player bared their teeth, “getting  _ back _ .” The ‘you idiot’ was clearly implied, but not-said. 

It moved not-further again, within arm reach now. The player’s armor was familiar, in a nearly painful way. White hair, red eyes, and a large scar across their face. “To… where?” 

The player bared his teeth again, but then his arms fell. 

Some part of it wanted to reach out in comfort, but it remembered the fists pounding against Nothing and the snarling teeth. “Were you banned?” It knew, after all, that this was the place where banned players went. None, so far, had  _ stayed _ . 

“I thought we were friends.” The fight left him, shoulders slumping. “I was making a joke.” 

“Uh,” it started, stopped. It was… out of its depth. 

But not-speaking had been the right choice, somehow. The player slumped down even further. “I thought we were okay. That he finally  _ liked _ me, that he would  _ welcome _ me.” 

“And he-” 

“He  **banned** me!” The player stood up, punched Nothing again. 

Somehow, that made the coin drop in Glitch’s mind. A clone, likely a formerly evil one, of Xisumavoid, primary admin of a pretty active server. He’d removed Glitch several times now. Quickly and surgically. “Damn.” 

Likely-Xisuma-Likely-Formerly-Evil sat down. Glitch stopped standing and was sitting. “I just wanted things like old times. Not even the really old times, just like… last time we’d met.” He shook his head. “I just wanted to be friends.” 

“Was it just him?” It had been there, after all. Only ever for the shortest of times, but it had seen many active players. 

Not-Xisuma shook his head, despondent. “I’d met some others there, too. I wanted to-” 

Get to know others. That’s likely how he would’ve ended the sentence. “Kinda dick move then.” It wondered if Xisumavoid had ever been banned. Had ever felt the pressure of Void seep into his very bones. It was hard to imagine he would’ve stuck around in the Void for long enough to notice. 

“I- wait what?” His eyes were large and red and yup, clearly an evil clone. 

Glitch shrugs, “sounds like last time you tried to better yourself and push come to shove he still kicked you out.” Underneath its fingers nothing was harsh so Nothing was soft. 

The player curls in on himself, his fingers attempting to grab at Nothing, but there was no-thing there to grasp. He shrugs. Not-words, but still so telling. 

“I’m not… like you.” Was it right, that Glitch talk about itself right now? It just wanted him to feel less alone. “I’m not a player, I’m Glitch, a glitch. I cause havoc by existing, no matter what I try.” The player was looking at it, tentatively, willing to listen still. “I think I met him, who banned you. He was quick and methodical. Sometimes people… aren’t.” Sometimes it gets to look around, gets to peak into bases and storage rooms. Sometimes every move it makes feels like papercuts as the admin tries and fails to remove it. It rather has the methodical over the bad. 

“Sounds like he’s  _ great _ then.” His tone is petulant but there’s a deep sadness underneath that. “Fucking… amazing.” 

“Did you even get to say hi before he tossed you out?” That was, after all, the question it wanted to ask. 

The player curls even further inward, wraps his arms around his knees. There’s a beat of not-sound. Not even the soft breaths echoing in his helmet. “No.” It’s small and soft. It feels like he gave Glitch a confession and a death sentence all in one. 

It swallows. The knowledge settles heavily in it. He likely did wrong, likely failed. He had been given a second chance. Only to have it rescinded as soon as he wanted to make good on it. “That’s fucking awful man.” It’s not enough. It makes Glitch want to punch someone. 

The player shrugs, quick and dismissive. The motion feels dismissive of himself, not the admin and that aches deep within Glitch. It made things worse, there was reason to want to be rid of it. It still wanted to belong. Him? He had a chance and it was taken from him. 

Glitch feels its insides turn. In sympathy and empathy. 

The Void presses against them still. It doesn’t want them, either. 

Remember you are not-Void. You are you, no-other thing. 

“Who else was there?” 

“What?” His eyes are teary and so wide. If he wasn’t wearing a helmet Glitch might have wiped his cheeks. 

“Other than the admin.” The words are not-harsh, the softest it can modulate itself. It was a crapshoot, really. Chances are the admin would’ve ‘dealt with’ his clone before he ever got to meet anyone else. But maybe… 

“I uh…” A flush spreads on the player’s face. “Yeah. There was actually a few. Worm man. He uh. He’s a hero.” 

Admiration, then, is likely the cause of the flushed face. “Oh?” 

He nods. “I’m his sidekick, actually!” His face was now not-sad. Not happy, either, but not-sad. 

“Really?” Glitch could feel the Void whispering. The familiar sensation of a world with open lines of code it could slide into. It wanted to slide into them. It wanted to slide out of this horrid place of Nothing. It not-left. “How’d that happen?” 

“Well…” He turns to face Glitch again. “I maybe kinda kidnapped him? But then I rescued him! And Xisuma gave me some of his merch for Christmas!” 

“Huh.” Glitch felt its eyes not-open and not-close in a slow blink. 

“He must hate me now.” The emotions on his face turned back to sadness again. “They must all hate me.” 

Glitch didn’t stay its hand. Poked the player’s knee. Poked it until he looked back at Glitch. “Or not.” 

He made a noise like a wet cat. 

“Nah for real man. You don’t know that.” It shrugged, at ease with the unknown. “Generally speaking none of us know shit, ya know? And when it comes to other people’s feelings thats even more true.” 

A glance away was all the answer Glitch got. 

“Unless you had a real intense in-depth talk with him, ya know, before Xisuma swooped in and banned you halfway through saying hi?” It wasn’t nice, the way it worded that. But then Glitch would never call itself nice. 

The man in front of him curled further in. He didn’t  _ say _ anything, but it understood the unsaid. 

“Yeah.” Glitch sat. Looked not-at the player in front of him. Looked at Nothing. “Shit’s fucky huh?” 

A snort and it smiled in return. “Yeah.” He moved his mouth, like letting the words slide until they fit just right. “Xisuma would’ve started beeping you.” 

“Huh?” 

“For language like that.” A vulnerable smile curls beneath his visor. 

Glitch smirks, pushes a defiant glint into its eyes. “Fuck that.” 

“Ha!” The laughter seems to surprise him, but it broke the dam. 

Glitch joins in, pushes against the not-noise with loud laughs. 

But the Void joins in. Pushes into the breathless silences and spreads them. Pushes until there is nothing but Void again. 

They are not wanted here. 

There is only Void here. 

Glitch has it easier. It knows this. After all, it’s familiar with this place. It can sense the code. It, unlikely players, doesn’t below in the worlds it gets booted to either. 

The player in front of him does belong. Somewhere. It must be more painful to him, feeling the Void press into him. 

He needed to leave, before the Void pressed too hard. Before the Void sunk in. It was in Glitch. The black screen of green code. In enters and curly brackets opened but not closed. 

The Void curled into the edges of it and pushed in and it shrugged it off. 

“Wait.” Hadn’t it seen Xisumavoid in the last world it had been in? A shimmer of the End? Of the soft void that only led to a temporary death? Of shulkers that were so friendly? 

The player looked at him, silent but with a firm gaze. 

It tried to remember, tried to feel its own logs. Somewhere, there had to be records. Had to be a list of has-beens. Digging into itself hurt, twisted its stomach. It pulled on code, on references, tasted the connections. 

“Uh…” A soft voice came from somewhere outside it. “Hey?”

It was close now, found the IP of its previous place. Close now. 

“Dude?” 

It opened its eyes and saw not-Nothing but the close face of EvilXisuma. “Oh shit!” Its face twisted, shock large enough to gather particles into a large exclamation mark of shock in front of it. 

“Dude?!” EvilXisuma’s voice was just as shocked. He fell in shock away from the suddenly appeared punctuation. “What just-?” 

“Code.” It panted and the particles fell away as its shock fell away too. “I was looking-” It panted. “You’re knocking on the wrong door.” 

EvilXisuma looked up at the Nothing he had been battering against. “Uh?” There wasn’t even a door there. There was not-anything. 

“Server change, it-” It shook its head, tried to jiggle the binary into a picture into words. “They’re no longer on that server. And that new server…” It took a breath. “EvilXisuma, you’re not banned from that server.” 

His face was no expression. A complete blank slate. 

“But you can’t enter normally, he’d just ban you again, no, we need to  _ sneak _ you in-” 

“Uh, person? How do you… wait- sneak me in?” 

Glitch stopped sitting and was standing instead. “Yes, like how the Void punts me out.” It started to pace. “Just need to find a crack, large enough to fit you, connected to that world, and staying here  _ makes _ the Void crack-” 

“Dude!” EvilXisuma placed a hand on its shoulder, stopping it in its tracks. “What are you  _ talking  _ about?” 

It blinked. “Getting you out.” It tilted its head. “Duh?” 

“Duh?” 

Glitch looked at EvilXisuma, felt the Void digging into him. “Do you want to stay?” Maybe the past was too painful. Maybe he would prefer to become part of the Void. 

He looked at Glitch, looked at nothing around them. “I-” A shudder wracked his body as the Void again tried to push them out. “No.” 

Glitched nodded. “Then let’s get you out.” It grabbed EvilXisuma’s arm, started to move not-close to the old world. The Void wanted EvilXisuma out. It wanted EvilXisuma out.  _ Work with me here, please? _ A little prayer never did anything, but that also meant it didn’t hurt. And the Void was inside Glitch. Maybe it was inside its head, too.

An echo, a crack. A something. Glitch plunged its hand in and felt the burn of refused access. 

“This one?” It dig its fingers unto the edge, keeping it open. 

EvilXisuma looked at it, the sparks of Something against the expansive Nothing. His fingers pushed into the crack. “Oh?” 

“Not hurting?” 

EvilXisuma pushed his hand deeper in. “No… it feels cool?” 

Glitch twitched its fingers. Focus on golden hair. Unkept and curly. Clench tighter. Feel the cold, let EvilXisuma guide. 

“Wow.” There was wonder in his eyes now. He pushed deeper still, nearly in upto his shoulder. 

“Feels right?” Part of it knew the answer, but Glitch still wanted to hear it, too. It still pushed its own broken nature into the crack to break it even further. 

“Yeah…” He pushed his other hand in, started to spread the opening himself. “Yeah!” 

“Then go.” There were particles swirling again, little sweat emote off to its sleep. “Go!” 

EvilXisuma turned to him, both arms into the illegal portal. “Uh… thanks.” 

“Go!” 

EvilXisuma jumped in, turned to look at Glitch and said his final words. “Good luck!” Then EvilXisuma fell into a cold cave, hopefully next to whoever Wormman was. 

Glitch let itself slip out of the crack, away from the connection it was banned from. “Thanks?” 

The Void didn’t reply. 

It sat back down. When was the last time it had talked to anyone? It hoped that EvilXisuma would see his Wormman sooner than that. 

The Void pressed in and Glitch, tired and exhausted, gave in. Let itself be whisked away to another world for another admin to clean up.   


**Author's Note:**

> yup, ex just pops into zeds cave. i have ideas for a follow up from zeds POV where ex suddenly shows up?? dunno if i have enough ideas to write it tho


End file.
